Identity authentication is a basic technical means for determining the identity of operators in computer and network systems and is a process of determining whether the identity of an object to be authenticated is true and effective. Commonly used identity authentication technologies in network systems include username/password, Kerberos (a network authentication protocol), and PKI (Public Key Infrastructure), and the like. These authentication means have one thing in common, that is, there is a third party organization that both of the two parties of authentication trust, identity information is published for the both authentication parties by the third party organization, and the identity information is used as the basis for determining the identity of the other party between both authentication parties.
However, such authentication mechanism as described above is prone to problems of affecting the availability and security of the entire system due to single point fault problem or security problem, this is because the fault of a certain or some nodes (for example, the both authentication parties or the trusted third party organization) in the system is likely to cause other nodes to fail to obtain the identity authentication information, and the address of the trusted third party organization in the network is usually fixed and is highly vulnerable to various attacks, and the security of the trusted third party organization is the basis of the security of the entire system, so that when the security of the trusted third party organization has problems, the security of the entire system cannot be guaranteed.